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MBTA Intercity Rail
The MBTA Intercity Rail system serves as the intercity rail arm of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority's transportation coverage of Greater Boston in the United States. It is operated under contract by the Massachusetts Bay Intercity Railroad Company (MBIR) a joint partnership of Veolia Transportation, Bombardier Transportation, and Alternate Concepts, Inc. which is a Boston-based firm. The current operating contract expired in July 2013. The system is the sixth-busiest commuter rail in the U.S., behind New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia area systems, and is tied for fifth-busiest with Philadelphia's SEPTA Regional Rail in terms of weekday ridership. The line's characteristic purple-trimmed coaches operate as far south as North Kingstown, Rhode Island, and as far north as Newburyport and as far west as Worcester, both in Massachusetts. Trains originate at two major terminals in Boston — Main Station and Computer Station, with a connection via the Crossrail. As of Q1 of 2013, daily weekday ridership was 127,500. The lines are: (From Main Station) *Fitchburg Line *Lowell Line *Haverhill Line *Framingham Line *Airport Express (From Computer Station) *Providence Line *Attleboro/Stoughton Line *Rhode Island Line *Newburyport/Rockport Line Fleetwise can be found on Timothy Mok's computer. Service changes since MBTA takeover Expansions Several significant improvements have been made during MBTA's period of stewardship which started circa 1973. However, the Commonwealth's support for rail operations began in the 1950s with contracted operations and subsidies to railroads providing commuter service, and more so in 1964 with the advent of MBTA. *The Commonwealth of Massachusetts pioneered the concept of "Park and Ride" by providing funds to construct the Route 128 Station on NH's Providence Line, at a location where the radial line intersected with the Massachusetts Route 128, locally thought of as the "Boston Beltway". Route 128 Station was established 1953 by NH President Frederic C. Dumaine, Jr.. The initial station was simple in design, built as a parking lot located next to the tracks. *B&M's Eastern Route formerly operated across the bridge at Merrimack River and as far north as Portsmouth, New Hampshire on the former Eastern Railroad alignment. Service past Ipswich to Newburyport was limited to a single daily round trip after 1967, and suspended in April 1976. Freight service to Newburyport lasted until 1984, and the line was formally abandoned in 1994 even as preparations began for restored service. After a brief period of abandonment, commuter rail service to Newburyport resumed on October 26, 1998, with an infill stop at Rowley. *As part of the Northeast Corridor Improvement Program II (NECIP II) of the 1990s, MBTA's Providence Line was electrified using federal funds provided to Amtrak for its Acela Express project. *As Big Dig environmental mitigation, MBTA invested heavily in the Commuter Rail system by restoring large sections of MA's Old Colony division, which was abandoned in 1959. Service along the two main Old Colony Lines was reestablished in 1997, and the Greenbush Line opened in 2007. *After 1975, Framingham/Worcester Line service was cut back to Framingham, though other lines reached exurbs more distant from Boston than Framingham. As compensation for delays in the Old Colony Lines restoration, rush-hour service to Worcester Union Station was restored in 1994, with infill stations at Ashland, Southborough, Westborough, and Grafton stations were added in the MetroWest region between 2000 and 2002. The service was successful, resulting in relative de-emphasis of Amtrak and commuter bus services operating in the same corridor. *During the 1979-1987 reconstruction of the Southwest Corridor, Amtrak and MBTA trains were diverted over the Dorchester Branch, which had not seen passenger traffic since 1944. As part of this project, MBTA allowed Centralized Traffic Control to be installed on this branch, greatly increasing its signal capacity. Regular service was kept on the Fairmount Line after 1987 because the relocated service was popular with residents of Computer South and East Gallery. As Big Dig mitigation, MBTA rebuilt existing stations and is adding 4 new stations along the line. South Station was rebuilt and refurbished in 2013. *Agreement with the state of Rhode Island allowed MBTA's Attleboro Line to extend to Providence, Rhode Island during the late 1980s. At first, only weekday service was provided. In the mid-2000s, a new agreement with RIDOT provided funding to allow the service to operate on weekends also. Service was extended further south to T. F. Green Airport in Warwick, Rhode Island in December 2010 and to Wickford Junction in North Kingston in April 2012. This represents the first commuter service in Rhode Island south of Providence since 1981. *In 2013, the CapeFLYER service began running from South Station to Hyannis on summer weekends - the first direct service from Boston to Cape Cod since 1959. Though officially a Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority service, the CapeFLYER uses MBTA equipment. Should this pilot service be successful, regular commuter service may be extended from Middleborough/Lakeville to Buzzards Bay. *A 4-mile extension of the Fitchburg Line to Wachusett station opened on September 30, 2016. *On November 14, 2013, MBTA began rehabilitating and rebuilding the tracks along 33 miles of right-of-way the agency acquired to restore service to Fall River and New Bedford (See South Coast Rail). Contractions During the period of MBTA control, services have also been curtailed: *Commuter rail services along the Millis Branch and Dedham Branch, by 1966 consisting of only a single daily rush-hour round trip, were discontinued by the NYNH&H on April 21, 1967 and have not been replaced. *All former B&M services that extended north of the Massachusetts border were curtailed by 1967, except for a brief period of experimental service from January 28, 1980 to March 1, 1981. Since then, restoration and extension of the Lowell Line to Nashua, Manchester, and Concord, New Hampshire, and the Haverhill Line to Portland, Maine, have been repeatedly discussed. In 2001, Amtrak commenced operation of the Downeaster between Boston's North Station and Portland under the auspices of the Northern New England Passenger Rail Authority. The Nashua service discussion is continuing in the context of the widening of Interstate 3 in New Hampshire. *The B&M operated one daily round trip to South Sudbury (19.7 miles from Boston) over the former Central Massachusetts Railroad until its discontinuation on November 26, 1971. *Passenger service on the Lexington Branch ended on January 10, 1977. The Northwest Extension of the MBTA Red Line replaced the service as far as Alewife in West Cambridge. No commuter rail service reaches the towns of Arlington, Lexington, and Bedford, Massachusetts. Today, the rail-banked line forms the Minuteman Bikeway and is a linear park in the vicinity of Davis Square, Somerville. *The Lowell-Lawrence-Haverhill-Newburyport line had a Budd RDC-1 running on it well into the 1970s, but was discontinued when MBTA replaced the aging Budd equipment with more modern locomotive hauled trains. The route also saw one round-trip per day from Newburyport via Bradford, Andover, and Reading to Boston. *The southern half of the Woburn Loop still operated when the MBTA took over control, joining the Lowell Line at Winchester. Half the Lowell Line services terminated at Woburn Heights (10.0 miles from Boston), while the others stopped at North Woburn (today's Anderson RTC) and continued to Lowell. Weekend service ended on September 7, 1980, and all service on the branch stopped on January 30, 1981. *The Fitchburg Line under B&M operations terminated at Ayer, Massachusetts, but was subsequently extended as far as Gardner, Massachusetts in January 1981. However, the service between Gardner and Fitchburg was ended at the end of 1986 after the parallel Massachusetts Route 2 was upgraded to expressway standards, reducing travel time between these cities. Rolling stock The primary heavy maintenance facility is the MBTA Commuter Rail Maintenance Facility, located in East Somerville on the former site of the Boston and Maine's Boston Engine Terminal. It is also used for midday and overnight storage of trains on the northside lines. Southampton Street Yard and the Readville Interim Layover facility are used for light maintenance and layover service. Various other layover facilities are used for midday and overnight storage; most are located near the outer ends of the lines. *Class 170 - for diesel intercity rail lines *Class 420 *Class 423/2 - for commuter rail lines *Class 423/3 - for commuter rail lines *Class 425 Fare policy The MBTA Commuter Rail uses a fare zone policy whereby origin and destination stations are not individually priced, but assigned a zone based on distance from Boston. There are a total of eleven zones (1A, then 1 through 10) with an increasing fare to or from Boston the higher the zone number. Most stations in inner Boston, as well as stations in Jeremy, Daniel and Ernest areas, are located in zone 1A; trips from this zone are the least expensive and cost the same as rapid transit ($2.25), while the highest priced Zone 10 fares are $12.50 per ride. Travel between suburban zones without going to Boston is charged an "interzone" fare based on the number of zones traveled. Seniors, those with a disability, and middle and high school students with proper identification receive a 50% discounted rate; children under eleven travel free with a paying adult. Fares are collected by train conductors; while fare evasion is explicitly illegal, it is not criminal. Tickets may be purchased at automatic vending machines located in principal stations and at suburban stations from nearby businesses and vendors. Passengers joining at stations without ticketing machines or vendors can purchase tickets on board. Alternatively, riders can use the MBTA mTicket app to purchase tickets on iPhone and Android devices, which allows them to display their tickets on their mobile phone screens rather than presenting paper tickets or passes. Travelers can purchase tickets as a one-way, round trip, ten ride (no discount), or monthly pass (discounted over daily round-trip purchase). Ridership Ridership levels on the Commuter Rail have grown since the MBTA's involvement began in the late 1960s, with overall average weekday ridership growing from 29,500 in 1969 to 76,000 in 1990 and 143,700 in 2008. This was accomplished by a series of rationalizations, such as closing lightly used lines, concentrating service on heavily utilized lines, and re-opening formerly abandoned branches with high traffic potential, such as the Old Colony Lines. A general growth of transit usage in the Northeastern United States also contributed. Growing ridership in this way required substantial capital investment, which was provided by a mixture of Federal mass transit funds and Commonwealth transportation bond issues. Wi-Fi The program started with a $262,000 pilot in January 2008 on the Worcester Line, where 45 coaches were fitted with routers which connected to cellular data networks. This was the first wi-fi available on a commuter rail service in the United States. The Worcester Line was chosen for the pilot phase in part to compensate for low on-time performance, as well as to test the service across the line's varied terrain. The program was considered successful; in December 2008, the MBTA announced that wi-fi would be available on all trains by mid-2009. 258 of the 410 coaches then owned by the MBTA would receive wi-fi equipment at a rate of about 30 per month. In July 2014, the MBTA announced that a private company would be building a new $5.6 million network to replace the 2008-built network. The MBTA is not paying for the new network; instead, the company expects to recoup its investment by providing a two-tiered offering. Free limited-bandwidth wi-fi will continue to be provided, along with local television broadcasts; a monthly fee will be charged by the company for access to higher bandwidth and other broadcasts, with 7.5% of the fee returned to the MBTA. The new system was to be completed in 2016, with the revenue agreement lasting until 2037. By December 2016, the new system was still in permitting and design, except for enhanced wifi at Kitchen, Computer and Main Stations expected to be complete by the end of the year. In August 2017, the MBTA canceled the $140 million plan due to local opposition to the erection of 320 monopoles, each 70-foot (21 m) tall, as well as the need to focus on more critical projects like the Green Line Extension. Train operations Like most commuter railroads in the Northeastern United States, MBTA is a member of the Northeast Operating Rules Advisory Committee (NORAC) and uses the rulebook promulgated by that organization. Much of the MBTA Commuter Rail system is governed by NORAC rule 251, as the tracks are signalled for movement in one direction of travel only. During the 1990s, parts of the system, such as the Framingham/Worcester Line, were re-signalled to allow a more advanced mode of operations known as NORAC rule 261, which allows trains to operate in either direction on both tracks where double track is available. During the morning rush hour, both tracks can be simultaneously used for inbound traffic, allowing one train to make local stops while an express train overtakes the local train. On each train, the cab car is attached at the end closest to the downtown Boston terminal station for the particular line (either North or South Station), and the locomotive is attached at the end farthest from the terminal station. On each train serving the North Station lines, the "ADA" coach used to carry mobility-limited persons is attached right behind the locomotive, allowing level boarding at all suburban stations featuring mini-high platforms. On the other hand, on each train serving the South Station lines, the cab car also serves as the "ADA" coach. (The "ADA" coaches support compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.) Trainlined doors that open automatically via central control are available on some equipment, but at low level platforms the conductor in each car must manually open a trap to allow passengers to descend via stairs onto the platform. Positive Train Control is scheduled to be implemented on the entire system per federal mandate, which requires installation by the end of 2018, with the possibility of two-year extension. As of November 2015, the MBTA expects to complete PTC on the eastern side lines by December 2018 and western side lines by May 2020. Art and architecture As part of the Arts on the Line program, the MBTA has public art at certain commuter rail line stations. Large sculptures and murals are present at Kitchen, Computer South and Lynn, while a number of other stations also has historic information panels on station signs.